Look Feature: MAC Philip Treacy – Cardinal Lips & Pink Blush Cheeks!

Kick-starting the Philip Treacy Look Feature with this mild little one here, it’s a quick look at how the Philip Treacy Blush Pink Highlighting Powder and Cardinal Lipstick wears, from afar, because a super zoom up lipswatch (seen here) can only showcase so much and no one’s going to look at your lips that near, right?

This was one of my first few attempts at wearing the Blush Pink Highlighting Powder and also one of the instances I realized… Wow okay, this bugger isn’t going to show up and capture easily.

In person, it does lend a nice soft touch to the skin, akin to the finish of meteorites but not as ethereal or soft glowy.

I think Temptalia hit the nail on the head when she described this is as a counter-productive highlighting product because its own formulation tends to mute the skin out a little, as opposed to lending a glowy finish to the skin.

For me, I still see some skin brightening going on, largely due to how the powder is slightly fairer than my skintone and a little pink in hue so you know, that gets the whole correcting and brightening aspect covered.

Sheen and glow-wise, it doesn’t quite cut it though there are really fine silver shimmers strewn into the product (albeit nicely dispersed) it doesn’t lend an obvious glimmer or shine to the skin.

You can see the shimmers under some light and up close but from afar, it’s quite faint. Which works out well because it’s not a glowy sheen, it’s actual small silver speckles so I doubt that would be flattering if they were obvious.

Anyway, in my face-spams, I tried to capture that brightened skin look and a little of the shine that the silver shimmers lend (there is a little but incredibly mild compared to glowy skin finishes that I love) but I don’t think I really managed to.

It’s something you have to see in person more.

But bottomline, I ended up using Blush Pink as more of a finishing powder and setting the face on occasions when I’m not really wearing much product that needs a flawless finish (i.e. weekends where it’s just sunscreen or tinted mosturizer).

There are some silver speckles but it doesn’t bother me for weekend-use since I’m not aiming for a flawless face finish anyway. Plus some skin brightening in the absence of makeup (liner and all) could do me some good.

I doubt I need to talk much about the lips but since I’ve shed so much light on Blush Pink already, let me just give Cardinal a little bit of love.

I like the bright fire-engine red when I feel up for it or when situations call for a matte, bright and bold red but most of the time, the kind of reds that catch me eye (and heart) are the ones with a slightly deeper edge.

Cardinal is red and vibrant but with a little bit of depth to it as well that gives it a slightly sultry vibe but nothing too vampy either that some would deem hard to pull off.

It is stunning and a shade that I hope MAC re-promotes again. Everyone could use with a Cardinal in their stash! Heh.

And that wraps up this Look Feature! I think I really took it to town with the rambles but I hope you guys enjoyed this read nonetheless.

Again, I do feel a little abashed that my timeframe is a little off and my mentions all going up so belatedly but, as said, I hope that they still provide a good form of resource one way or another!

I could very simply just do away with mentioning it – so late, might as well don’t say? – but… I guess for my own purpose I wanted to log it all down as well. It’s fun doing looks and talking makeup and it doesn’t always have to be on trend and the latest, right? That’s just like what everyone else is doing, heh.